An air conditioner for a vehicle is known to have a rear air conditioning unit that performs an air conditioning for a rear space inside a vehicle compartment (refer to JP 2009-040304 A). The rear air conditioning unit is positioned in a space defined between a rear trim, which is located in the rear space inside the vehicle compartment, and an exterior plate of the vehicle.
The rear air conditioning unit has a blower fan, an evaporator, and a heater core. The blower fan draws air from an inside of the vehicle compartment and blows the air toward the evaporator and the heater core. The evaporator cools the air flowing from the blower fan. The heater core heats the air that flows into the heater core after passing through the evaporator. Air, a temperature of which is adjusted by the evaporator and the heater core in the rear air conditioning unit, is blown into the vehicle compartment through a duct.
The above-described rear air conditioning unit has a housing. The housing generally defines an air passage therein and includes a suction port, i.e., an air inlet. Air flows into the air passage from the suction port.
A suction duct is attached to the housing of the rear air conditioning unit. The suction duct defines an air guiding passage therein. The air guiding passage connects the suction port of the rear air conditioning unit and a suction port of the rear trim. The suction duct guides the air to flow from the suction port of the rear trim to the suction port of the rear air conditioning unit.
Thus, air is introduced from the inside of the vehicle compartment to the suction port of the rear air conditioning unit through the suction port of the rear trim (i.e., an interior member) and the suction duct.
Here, the suction duct is provided separately from the housing of the rear air conditioning unit. Therefore, a quantity of components may increase and man-hours for assembling the components may increase.